Big Break

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1) Where did Matt first get experience?
TV Shows
Theater
Movies
Commercials
2) What do actors need to join a union?
An agent
A speaking role
An inside contact
3) What happened after he joined the union?
He became a SAG member.
He got lots of work.

Todd: OK, now Matt, you used to work in Hollywood as an actor. Can you talk about what kind of actor you were?

Matt: Sure. I acted mainly in commercial work and that is I auditioned for commercials and basically in Los Angeles it's unlike any other city in the world for acting and it's just so heavily centered around Hollywood and television and screen work that there isn't really a lot of work in theater so I didn't have a ton of training going in to the acting world when I entered L.A. so like many others I opted just for commercial work and tried to get experience that way.

Todd: Oh, cool. So how do you actually get a gig? Tell me about the process.

Matt: It actually... It's a lot more complicated than I thought when I first got there and competitive. Basically, there are two types of actors in Los Angeles. There's union actors and non-union. And to really progress you need to be a union actor which takes getting a speaking part or doing commercial work, which took me about six months and from there becoming a SAG member, screen actor's guild member. You're in the union which looks a lot better on your resume to go after agents so that was my next step and after I got an agent then I was able to be sent out on auditions and look for work that way.

Todd: So how did you get your first big break?

Matt: It was just by chance really. I was acting and I was doing a lot of non-speaking work on television and movies and really not progressing as fast as I wanted to and I was on a commercial for I think it was Pepsi and they liked my look and they needed an extra guy in the scene in a library and they put me in and from that thirty second spot which was shown all the East Coast of the United States I has half of my income for my first year because you get royalty checks every time a commercial is shown on television. You get paid, so...

Todd: Nice.

Matt: Yeah... But from there I went back to television and movies.

Todd: Cool.